Effective Field Goal Percentage:
The Bulls rank 27th at .457. The only teams behind them are the Charlotte Bobcats (.450), Minnesota Timberwolves (.449) and New Jersey Nets (.424). Those three teams have a combined record of 5-36.

Turnover Percentage:
The Bulls actually rank 10th at .134. So at least they’re taking care of the ball. The teams ahead of them include the Los Angeles Lakers (.134), Houston Rockets (.134), Denver Nuggets (.131), Orlando Magic (.131), Dallas Mavericks (.123), New Orleans Hornets (.123), San Antonio Spurs (.123), Toronto Raptors (.118) and Atlanta Hawks (.115). With a couple exceptions, those are all pretty good teams.

Offensive Rebounding Percentage:
After a strong start in this area, the Bulls dropped down to the middle of the pack, ranking 14th at .273. It’s probably no coincidence that opponents have been concentrating on blocking the Bulls out (especially Joakim Noah) the last several games. When a team shoots as poorly as the Bulls do, denying them offensive rebounds is a great way to choke off one of their best scoring opportunities.

Free Throw Rate:
The Bulls rank 27th at .194, which is pretty much what you’d expect from a jump shooting team. Oddly enough, the Lakers are ranked 28th at .185. You’d think that a team with an imposing frontcourt (Andrew Bynum, Lamar Odom, Pau Gasol) and Kobe Bryant would be closer to the top of the league in this category.

Defensive Rebounding Percentage:
Defensive rebounding was a problem last season, when the Bulls ranked near the bottom of the league. They started off the 2009-10 season doing a better job on the defensive boards, but they’ve been regressing the past week or so. They now rank 19th at .727.

Free Throw Rate:
The Bulls rank 8th at .203, which means that they aren’t sending thier opponents to the line. So they’ve got that going for them…which is nice.

Miscellaneous
The Bulls are:

4-0 when outrebounding their opponent

2-7 when outrebounded

3-3 when pulling down more offensive rebounds than their opponent

3-3 when out-assisting their opponent

5-1 when earning more free throw attempts

4-5 when committing fewer turnovers than their opponent

3-1 when blocking more shots than their opponent

6-1 when committing fewer fouls than their opponent

1-0 when scoring 100 points

0-4 when giving up 100 points

6-1 when holding their opponent to 90 or fewer points

0-6 when giving up more than 90 points

Conclusions:
The Bulls have played only 13 games, so this is a pretty small sample size. They’ve also just suffered three straight blowout losses, which can skew the statistics. For instance, they’ve dropped from 4th to 13th in Defensive Rating after the last three games.

Still, all signs point to the fact that the Bulls range from mediocre to outright bad in most categories…although their defense and ball handling have both been pleasant surprises thus far. However, the Pythagorean W-L number suggests that the Bulls aren’t even as good as their 6-7 record indicates.